303 



they always passed the summer on the bird-grounds, and thus 

 lived far from just those settlements, such as Umanark, Net- 

 schilivik, Itivdlerk and Narsark, from which there is access to 

 these hunting grounds over the inland ice. Until the time 

 when Peary began his expeditions, the bow and arrow were 

 the main weapons in hunting the reindeer. The Polar Eski- 

 mos became all at once keen deer-hunters and they seem to 

 have rapidly become just as expert and untiring in the hunt 



Vlf^ il^""" 



Fig. 5. 



Musk-ox hunting, drawn by the Eskimo Samik. According to his own explanation the 

 one individual has "fallen on the stones". The other hunter (supposed to be Samik him- 

 self) attacks the first musk-ox, seeking to wound the animal in the heart with the lance 



(or gun ?). 



as other Eskimo tribes. The long, converging rows of stakes, 

 between which the herds of deer are driven into an ambush and 

 which are so common among the other Eskimos, do not seem 

 to have been used by the Polar Eskimos. One of their hunting 

 methods and the most primitive meant simply finding a trail 

 and following it at a steady run, until the animal was approa- 

 ched so near that it could be struck by an arrow. With re- 

 gard to other methods, the Eskimo Imerarsuk told the following 

 to Knud Rasmussen, and I obtained a similar description from 

 the old angakok Masaitsiak. "The deer at that time followed 



